Memories
by Forensic Kitteh
Summary: Because some memories were important, and you could never forget them. RaiNy-ish, and it's pretty strange. One shot, perfectly platonic, set in the past with a patrol cop Ryan, and Natalia is still with Nick. Rated T for violence!


Something was bothering Ryan.

A memory that seemed to stick in his mind.

He didn't even remember what it really was. All he remembered that it was a call out when he was still working patrol.

And yet he couldn't understand what was bothering him so much. Simple call out, and yet nine years later it's still on his mind.

Ryan opened the PD's database, filtering the cases before when he joined CSI to the cases that he worked.

Still more than a thousand tickets and call outs. Ryan thought, trying to remember what the whole thing was about.

It was a domestic abuse case. That narrowed things down a lot. Ryan scrolled through the domestic abuse calls that he was sent out to, looking for something that stood out.

And something did stand out.

At the end of the list, there was a line where the victim's was listed at "Natalia Townsend.". Ryan sighed, the memories that were bothering him becoming as clear as though what he had witnessed it yesterday.

-flashback-

"Hey, we got a domestic call." Ryan's partner said. The two of them were outside of their patrol car, Ryan's partner smoking. His name was Dennis, and he would never stop smoking. At least that was what he had told Ryan when Ryan saw him smoking the first time.

"Not driving." Ryan said. Dennis snorted, grinding the stub into the side of a trashcan, before flicking it into the can.

The house that they were called out to was nice, save for the screams coming from the property. Dennis and Ryan got out of the car, without turning of the bubble lights or the siren. There was no time for that.

"I think they're behind the house." Dennis said, as he and Ryan went around the house from both sides, guns in hand. Once they rounded the house, and were in the backyard, they saw what they were called out to.

And it was surely a scene that neither Ryan nor Dennis wanted to see again. A man had someone, probably his wife or girlfriend pinned up against the wall, his fingers encircling the brown haired woman's neck.

"Oh, you called the police." The guy sneered, his blue eyes full of some untold evil. He turned his face to Ryan and Dennis, who still had their guns pointed towards him.

"Let her go." Dennis was the first one to speak up, but the guy only smirked, tighting his hold on the brunette's neck.

"No." He said, making so that the brunette couldn't breath at all, and it about a split second, Dennis had pulled the offender off, the brunette crumbling to the floor, wheezing for air.

"No?" Dennis asked, handcuffing the guy, before dragging him off back to the patrol car.

"What's your name, ma'am?" Ryan asked, helping the brunette up, her hands still nervously still rubbing her neck.

"Natalia Townsend. But just call me Natalia." She said, lowering her gaze to the floor as Ryan ascessed her wounds. Scratches, cuts, bruises covered all the wasn't covered by Natalia's heavy clothing. Her lip was splint and her brown hair was full of debris along with some blood. Ryan looked around the scene, and saw that the wall that Natalia was pressed up against also had a splotch of blood. "Who called this time?" She asked bitterly.

"I- um- what happened?" Ryan asked, although he noted what Natalia had said. Natalia didn't answer. "Look, whatever you tell me, it won't reach your-"

"Husband. He's my husband." Natalia said, sounds of a struggle where heard from Dennis and Nick.

Ryan helped the brunette up onto a chair, where she sat, tears still flowing silently down her face. "Can you just tell me what happened?" Ryan asked.

"Sure, why not?" Natalia answered bitterly, feeling the back of her head, feeling the stickiness of blood on her fingers. Natalia just stared out into space for a while, before trying to get up. "I don't even remember what happened." She said.

Ryan frowned. What this woman covering for her husband or was it something completely else? Sure, he'd only worked two domestic violence cases before this one, but neither of them victims said that they didn't "remember" what happened.

"Anything is helpful, ma'am." Ryan said. Natalia sighed.

"Am I starting to really look like a ma'am?" She asked. Ryan had no idea how to answer. "It was just the usual stuff." She answered.

"I'm sorry, I don't understand- the usual stuff?" Ryan asked. "I promise you, anything that you tell me, it is confidential." Ryan said.

"Yeah, I know that." Natalia nodded. "The usual stuff, is just, he thinks that I'm out with someone else, someone that he doesn't approve of, and when I come home, if I'm late, or I look not right, we'll always almost end up fighting." Natalia said. "Today, I decided to tell him that I know that he was cheating on me, and look where that landed me." Natalia said bitterly.

"None of this is your fault, Natalia." Ryan said, and Natalia scoffed.

"I'm sorry, but that phrase is over used by the police." Natalia said, and Ryan frowned. "Look, just let him go, please." Natalia said, but Ryan shook his head.

"No, and yes maybe that phrase is over used, but it's the truth. There's no situation where a man can ever hurt the one that he loves. If he doesn't love that person anymore, there's a door made for situations like that. Lawyers as well." Ryan said. "And, we can't release him, because he did physically assult yo-"

"I can't drop charges?" Natalia asked.

"You've dropped a few charges already, and this is the fifth time that we've been called out here." Ryan said. "We'd like to question him." Ryan said, even though he knew that they had no right to hold him if Natalia wanted the charges to be dropped. Except for well, disruption of peace. "Also, I have two peices of advice, and please don't contact my commanding officer afterwards, because that may land me into a rather uncomfortable postition." Ryan said.

"And those are?" Natalia asked, smirking.

"One, get your head checked out, because it looks like you have a slight concusion, and I've experienced them, they're not nice when they go untreated. So are broken collarbones. Two, think about getting a divorce from him, because if he's treating you like he is, he doesn't deserve you, and if there was something between you two, it's gone and probably not coming back." Ryan said.

"Right." Natalia nodded.

"Look, here's my card." Ryan handed Natalia his card, and Natalia took it from him, pocketing it quietly into her sweater. Pretty much, every cop that has ever been in the Townsend household before had given Natalia a card, and all of them ended up in the garbage, shredded into peices. Maybe this one needed to live. "If you ever need anything, just give me a call, okay?"

"Yeah." Natalia said, even though she knew that calling anyone would be a problem.

"Be careful, okay?" He asked, and Natalia nodded, and Ryan left.

-end flashback-

Pulling himself out of the memory was more painful than anything that Ryan had ever felt before. The last part kept on replaying in his mind as he turned off the computer, and headed to the lockerroom. Ryan felt like there was another part to what happened. And why hadn't he recognized Natalia as a domestic abuse victim that he had helped back when he had just started patrol?

Because of course, no one ever assumes that the new girl in the lab is a victim of something.

Ryan stopped short of the lockerroom, and decided that it was not a good idea for him to go home at the moment. Something was missing from his memory.

There was another part, but Ryan couldn't figure out what it was.

"Are you working a double shift today or something?" Natalia asked, suddenly appearing by Ryan's side.

"Er, yeah. I have some stuff I still need to go over. I guess it's more like one and half of a shift that I'm working today." Ryan said, his voice strained. Did Natalia know that Ryan knew more about her past than she had probably wanted him to? Ryan wished that she didn't.

"Oh, well, see you tomorrow then." Natalia smiled, before leaving.

Natalia's bright smile triggered another search in Ryan's memories.

-flashback-

"So, who asked for me again?" Ryan asked, as he signed in at the front desk of Miami General.

The secretary checked something on the computer. "Natalia Townsend." She said, and noticed how pale Ryan's face became when she mentioned Natalia's name. "Do you know her?"

"I gave her my card a few weeks ago, and she's in the Trauma Unit?" Ryan asked, completly breaking off the train of thought that he was on when he was telling the secretary how he knew Natalia. If her husband had escalated enough to land her in the traume unit, then if she would go back, there was too much of a big possibility that she would end up next door to the PD.

"Would you like a nurse to show you where she is?" The secretary asked, and Ryan nodded.

Ryan was led to Natalia's room, and Ryan felt as though he was going to be sick when he saw Natalia in the hospital bed, her whole face covered with bruises.

"I guess it's time to take the second peice of advice and put it into action, isn't it?" Natalia asked.

"Can I ask what happened?" Ryan asked, not wanting to sit down.

"No, because I don't know, and I don't want to remember." Natalia said, and Ryan nodded understandingly. "Sorry, for calling you out like this, but what do I do now?" Natalia asked.

"You take the second peice of advice, put it into action, and just get as far as possible from this guy." Ryan said. "And don't go back." Ryan said.

"My sister told me the same thing. She also promised make my dad force me divorce my husband, if I don't do it myself." Natalia said, and Ryan smirked.

"Smart sister." Ryan said, and Natalia smiled.

"You should tell her that. She'd really appreciate it." Natalia said.

"Look, I really am running short on time right now, but I'm glad that you called me." Ryan said.

"Well, then go, if you're running short on time, officer!" Natalia exclaimed.

"Well, take care." Ryan said, and Natalia answered him with a smile.

-end flashback-

And Ryan just wondered how he would end up getting any sleep after remembering, or more like, finding out all these things about Natalia's past with Nick, an aspect of her life that she didn't like to share with anyone if there was no urgent reason to do so.

He felt as though he had just exposed so many private aspects of Natalia past that he felt sick. Some things that just better kept hidden and quiet.

He knew too much, and he was afraid that Natalia would find that out as well.

* * *

><p><strong>In three words: Don't even ASK.<strong>

**But in more than 3 words, this thing might have a longer explanation. With the Fray's songs. Or they can go alone. **

**And I started editing BCC and Skeletons in the Sand(aha, new title) and my face is like O_O for the last one, because it's so deep, and I'm like...O_O omg, I wrote that thing in 5 days. **

**Whatever, if you wanna review, review, if you think that this is strange, well, you're not the only one. I also think that this is very strange one shot.**

**OaO, this person that has no life, and hates writing with a passion now. :P **


End file.
